Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Where is the Grand Jury Reforms?, Pols Escape Blame 424

On the Last Day the DOJ Moves on the Garner Grand Jury? No Go No Charges

SOURCES: GRAND JURY HEARS ERIC GARNER CASE -- Post's Shawn Cohen, Larry Celona and Bruce Golding: "The Obama administration is scrambling to secure an indictment in the racially charged, NYPD killing of Eric Garner before President-elect Donald Trump takes office Friday and potentially scraps the case, sources told The Post. Federal prosecutors from Washington, DC, called cops in front of a Brooklyn grand jury Wednesday, and more witnesses are expected to testify Thursday, the sources said. ... Garner's mom, Gwen Carr, told The Post she's been 'really hoping that we will get some type of justice and accountability, even if it's on the last day.' 'But if it doesn't, I was still going to remain hopeful it could happen under a Trump administration, because everyone's seen the injustice done to my son,' she added."

DA's Push Back At Schneiderman's Role As Special Police Shooting Investigator

Jim Callaghan writes in the Daily News about the history of race relations and describes why Staten Island didn’t riot after the grand jury decision not to indict Officer Daniel Pantaleo, who put Eric Garner in a fatal chokehold: reports:

Barron Proposing Grand Jury Ban (YNN)“There’s no sense in having a special prosecutor who’s also part of the system, and he can impanel a grand jury and have a secret proceeding,” Barron said during a telephone interview Thursday. “We won’t know how he’s presenting witnesses or interpreting forensic evidence..This is not in any way interfering with the special prosecutor. In fact, it strengthens him, because he will have to present in public, and not in a private grand jury setting.”*De Blasio warned: End secret grand juries or supporters will ‘shut city down’ (NYP) A Brooklyn pol wants to replace secret grand juries with open court proceedings whenever a cop kills a civilian — and vowed Monday to make Mayor de Blasio go along with the plan. Democratic Assemblyman Charles Barron said supporters will “shut this city down” if de Blasio doesn’t get on board. * Alongside activists including Eric Garner’s mother, Brooklyn Assemblyman Charles Barron unveiled a proposal to eliminate grand jury proceedings for police officers accused of killing civilians, the Observerreports:

Wednesday Update Taxpayers’ response to Garner settlement: He ‘isn’t a martyr’ (NYP) * The facts that got lost in the $5.9 million Garner payout (NYP Ed) * In a rare trip outside state lines, Gov. Andrew Cuomo today will address the NAACP’s national convention in Philadelphia Wednesday about his recent appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate cases where police kill unarmed and other civilians. * Speaking at an interfaith church service last night marking the one-year anniversary of Eric Garner’s death, NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio said the incident has helped move the city forward and usher in significant changes within the NYPD. * De Blasio sought to create a balance in his remarks, saying “all lives matter,” “black lives matter” and “blue lives matter.” * Members of the Garner family say their $5.9 million settlement with the de Blasio administration, which the comptroller’s office described as the largest settlement in the history of the city over a killing by police officers, will not end their push for police reform.* Cuomo is expected to discuss his recent appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate cases where police kill unarmed suspects or civilians when addressing the NAACP’s national convention today, the Daily Newswrites: * De Blasio spoke carefully about more police reforms at a memorial service for Eric Garner, who died a year ago from a police chokehold in Staten Island, which was also attended by New York City police officers, The New YorkTimes writes: * Anger mounted Tuesday over the city’s decision to settle with the Garner family over his death that occurred following an arrest for selling loose cigarettes on Staten Island last summer, the Post writes: * For DAs, More Clarity Needed On Special Prosecutor’s Role (YNN) * Mayor Bill de Blasio avoided explaining why he included the statements “all lives matter” and “blue lives matter” alongside “black lives matter” during last night’s memorial service for Eric Garner, a black man killed by a cop, the Observer reports:Friday City Comptroller’s Office Dispenses Few Answers but Writes Real Checks (NYY) In concluding, without explanation, that the Garner estate should be paid, Scott Stringer has extended the silence in a new direction.* Sharpton, Citizen Action Back Schneiderman In DA Dispute (YNN

DA's Push Back At Schneiderman's Role As Special Police Shooting Investigator

Eric Garner’s mother was a member of the group that met with Cuomo. She called the meeting “very positive,” though a spokeswoman for the families said they still believe the governor’s independent monitor proposal doesn’t go far enough. (They would prefer a special prosecutor’s office, and will continue to push for it).* The revelation of post-arrest questioning of people involved in the demonstration’s following a grand jury’s decision not to indict the officer involved in Eric Garner’s death has renewed long-running concerns among civil liberties activists about police practices that may have a chilling effect on activities protected by the First Amendment, like protest and free speech. * Stewart-Cousins: Criminal Justice Reforms Sooner, Not Later(YNN)* A criminal justice reform advocate claims that Cuomo told her and others that the special prosecutor that would handle cases of alleged police brutality would be state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, State of Politics reports: * Senate Minority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins expects changes to the state’s criminal justice system before the end of the legislative session, State of Politicswrites:

NYP Says Judge Was Wrong Not To Release the Records . . . Will Albany Open Grand Jury Records?

Judge Garnett’s mistake (NYP Ed) Staten Island Supreme Court Justice William Garnett writes that, should he release grand-jury records in the death of Eric Garner, The Post “would merely publish all, or part of, the minutes and might use them as grist for its editorial mill.” Let’s be clear: However good our “mill” might be, it is no reason to keep the facts from the public in this case of utmost public interest. And our “compelling and particularized need” for the records lies in our nature as a New York newspaper — to bring such facts before the public, so that each citizen can judge for him- or herself. Judge Garnett writes that continued secrecy will prevent the grand jury from being subject to “unbridled speculation” about its integrity. Sorry: Such “unbridled speculation” has been rampant from the instant the grand jury’s decision was released, if not before. People across the city and the nation continue to second-guess the jury’s findings — without having heard the evidence that was presented to it. The judge may believe that the high legal bars to overturning grand-jury secrecy have not been met here, but one simple fact remains: Keeping the Garner grand-jury records sealed will only further erode public trust in the justice system’s ability to get it right. We do not look forward to having to keep running that ugly fact through our editorial mill.

Judge won’t release grand jury testimony from Eric Garner case (NYP) A judge on Thursday refused to release testimony heard by a grand jury that declined to indict a police officer in the chokehold death of Eric Garner, arguing there wasn’t a good enough reason to release the secret information. Donovan argued that the disclosure would damage the credibility of prosecutors seeking to assure both grand jurors and witnesses that details of their participation would be kept from public view. Following the grand jury’s decision, Donovan asked for some information to be made public, but it didn’t include testimony or exhibits shown to jurors. The law required the NYCLU and the other parties who brought the lawsuit to establish a “compelling and particularized need” to release the grand jury minutes, the judge wrote. *

Abandoning the poor (NYP Ed) Many of those pushing this are in the anti-cop camp, and simply looking for political cover. But Commissioner Bill Bratton plainly wants the reinforcements so he can keep crime down. We’re not unsympathetic to Mayor de Blasio for being reluctant here. The move commits the city to spending millions of dollars in future years — dollars that can’t go to feed the hungry, house the homeless or just fix the roads. Yet the NYPD plainly needs some kind of help — because not a week passes without cops being hamstrung in some new way. The latest lunacy landed this month, and will harm the city’s poor and minorities the most. The brass have had to gut the quarter-century-old “Clean Halls” program designed to increase security in public-housing buildings. It encouraged cops to clear out or detain loiterers who qualified as trespassers. But de Blasio settled another case where stop-and-frisk Judge Shira Scheind­lin opted for injustice. Now cops must have a demonstrable “reasonable suspicion” that loiterers are in a building illegally before approaching them. This, when the most significant uptick in violent crime over the last year has come in public-housing projects. Just last weekend, a man was fatally shot outside the Gowanus Houses in Brooklyn.

A Judge’s Idea for Grand Jury Reform (NYT Ed) Proposals from New York’s chief judge would be a step toward restoring public trust in the justice system. Lawmakers should give Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman’s grand jury reform proposals serious consideration if they want to ensure that the public can trust that police will answer for their acts,* Lippman‘s lunatic grand-jury ‘fix’(NYP) Why would anyone need a grand jury? The answer is to protect against a rush to judgment. Or, as Chief Justice Earl Warren once put it, “to determine whether a charge is founded upon reason or was dictated by an intimidating power or by malice and personal ill will.” The uproar over the Garner case was precisely because the grand jury carried out the assignment as understood by Warren and the authors of the New York and United States constitutions. Lord knows what would have happened had a judge intervened. Inserting a judge into the grand-jury room is bizarre enough in and of itself, but Lippman also wants to end grand-jury secrecy. That is, again, he wants to end such protection for certain accused persons, namely police officers and others in police-civilian encounters. All kinds of reasons exist for grand juries to conduct their deliberations in secret. This is so fundamental that it has existed in English law for centuries and is required by New York state law.* * The state’s first African-American county clerk took office, reminiscing about his experiences with racial segregation and vowing to encourage more minorities to serve on Manhattan juries, the Daily News reports: *Erie County DA Knocks Lippman’s Criminal Justice Approach (YNN) Not so fast, said Erie County District Attorney Frank Sedita, who also leads the statewide district attorneys association. In an interview, Sedita took issue with the proposal to have judges reside over such cases, saying such a move is a distinctly European import. “Our Founding Fathers had rejected that system,” Sedita said. * The NYT says legislators should give Chief Judge Lippman’s grand jury reform proposals “serious consideration if they want to ensure that the public — and particularly those in minority communities where residents most often encounter law enforcement — can trust that police will be held to answer for their acts.”

The 11th preview from the Opportunity Agenda came in the form of a 176-page report from the governor’s Commission on Youth, Public Safety and Justice, appointed as part of a Cuomo initiative from his 2014 State of the State address to examine how the state treats 16 and 17-year-old offenders. * The commission recommended, and Cuomo supported, ending the state’s policy of treating minors in the criminal justice system as adults. New York is one of just two states – the other being North Carolina – that does this. * Cuomo is considering requiring automatic state reviews when grand juries fail to indict in police brutality cases. Under a scenario being discussed with interested parties, once a grand jury decides not to indict, the DA would be required to transmit all records from the case — including grand jury transcripts — to the state entity doing the review.

Where are the Protests to Demand DA's Conflict of Interests Grand Jury Reforms?

The admonishment came in the wake of Saturday’s execution-style slayings of two NYPD cops as they sat in a patrol car in Brooklyn. “The court administrator told her she exercised poor judgment, and that she had a case on later that night, and that she should exercise better judgment in that case,” the source said. On Tuesday night, Johnson released Travis Maye, 26, without bail following his arrest in a violent melee with cops earlier that day. According to court records, Maye took swings at cops at Flatbush Avenue and Prospect Place at around 1:35 a.m., socking one officer in the eye and sending him to the hospital.

Why Did the Protesters Go After the Cops When It Was Elected Officials That Control the Prosecutorial System That Let the Garner Chokehold Cops Go?

Pols Set-Up Cops:

Blame Game

Community activist Tony Herbert who introduced a family member of officer Rafael Ramos said it the best, elected officials are using the cops, turning the community against them. Herbert ask why are the elected officials forcing to the cops to raise money for the city? The relationship between the community and the police are strained Herbert said, cops are forced to give out parking tickets, act as tax collectors for government. That creates tension between the community and cops. Herbert also has complained why the cops are force to deal with people who have mental problems, when it was the elected officials who have not properly dealt with that populations. Police did not cause bad schools, high black unemployment, homelessness or the inequities of the criminal justice system that puts male blacks in jail at a much hirer rate, elected officials did. In other words he says the pols use the cops. Yet they have to deal with the problems that are created by government failure. The pols has escaped any blame with the Grand Jury system which they control It was the Grand Jury Run by the Staten Island DA Donovan that failed to indict the cop who put the chokehold on Garner. Yet the words out of de Blasio, Sharpton and dozens of elected officials many who has a say on how the state's prosecutorial system works, have all been directed to blame the cops.

Pols Untouched (Except Mayor) for Any Blame On the Failure of Police Community Relations

Brooklyn Bridge Protest 'What do we want? Dead cops,' Now PO Ramos and Liu Can't Breathe and the Pols who said almost nothing after demonstrators attacked cops on the bridge are attending the memorials

Pols Have Made the Job of Policing Impossible By Not Fixing Social Ills That Create Tension Between Cops and the Community

Any Outrage OutThere for Ramos and Liu, Protesters? (Daily Beast) “Once a bullet leaves a gun, it has no friends,” the late Sen. Pat Moynihan once said. That is the nature of power, too. Those who have it must take extra care to be precise in their words and actions, lest they unleash the dogs of hell. The mayor failed that test miserably. He can run from the consequences, but he can’t hide. His mayoralty is sunk unless he comes to grips with the fact that he lit the fuse that led to Saturday’s explosion. For two years, starting with his 2013 campaign, he painted a target on the NYPD. Many of us warned repeatedly that he was playing with fire, but he saw his election as a blank check.